Sunrise on the Mediterranean (67 page)

He frowned at my henna job, then kissed her right palm again. Uri’a picked her up, now boneless with disappointment, and carried
her off.

Thunder shook the building. Avgay’el invited me to stay, wait for Cheftu to finish his day’s work, in the peace of the women’s
quarters. I had fallen asleep when Avgay’el nudged me. Her voice was low. “Dadua wants to see you.”

I rinsed my face and walked with Shana to a smaller audience chamber. Yoav was there, frowning over a papyrus. Dadua hopped
up when he saw me. “Would you care for wine, Klo-ee?”

“B’seder,”
I said. “The temple,
ach
, well, Shaday does not want me to build it.”

Cheftu had mentioned that; it was completely in keeping with what we knew of the Bible.

“So, I wish to make a uniform that all the
giborim
will wear.”

The Egyptians’ and Pelestis’ professional appearance had gotten to him?

“Yoav,” he said, gesturing to the
Rosh Tsor haHagana
,

“has commissioned shields from your cousins, the Pelesti, in Ashdod.”

I nodded. “Perhaps you could speak to them, work us a deal?”

I nodded; I was getting better at bartering, and I would take Cheftu. Maybe I could even see Wadia?

Dadua stepped closer to me. I could smell his skin, he was so close. The mushroom would kill me to be here now. “I have sought
for an emblem to symbolize Tziyon, our position here.” He raised his hands in frustration. “Nothing, nothing comes to me.
Not even Hiram’s skilled and gifted designers can think of a thing.”

“Ken?”

“Then today, at that girl’s wedding, I see it!”

“See what?”

“The emblem! It is so clear,” Dadua cried. “Such a standard for Tziyon, for the united monarchy!”

I was holding my breath. “This! It is this!” He whipped out a piece of papyrus. There, with far less grace than the original,
was my design from the mushroom’s hand. Without the swirls, the curves, the angles, it was simply one triangle.

With another over it, upside down. “It has three points, the sacred cities in the north on one, then three other points, the
sacred cities of the south, on the other. They overlap in Tziyon!”

I stared at it. Two triangles that did indeed overlap. “This will be easy to do! We can put it everywhere!”

I like stars, the mushroom had said. So I made one. From two triangles. Then a man named David, who just started a country,
saw it. Liked it. Decided to use it.

Could I put this on my résumé? “It will be the Shield of Shalem, for this city will be a city of peace, a city of Shaday.
It’s perfect!”

I designed the Shield of Solomon, also called the Star of David, because I knew that it was the Star of David, because of
history. The history that I had just made—sort of. There was nothing to do but laugh. Circular reasoning had become my life.

“I
T PLEASES ME THAT YOU
have joined in my feasting,” RaEm said, reclining.

Dadua, flanked by several soldiers, stood in her doorway. The tents of her people weren’t accustomed to the rains, so her
soldiers had learned from the Tsori how to cut the trees. Now a wooden shelter covered her tent but darkened it. And nothing
could keep out the cold. She shivered, but when
haNasi’
s gaze dropped to her hardened nipples RaEm sent a quick word of thanks to the gods of cold weather.

“Please, make yourself comfortable,
adoni,”
she invited, practicing this tongue that was so foreign. However, she’d had little else to do during the heat of summer.
“Your soldiers can wait in the comfort of the next tent. My slaves will see that our needs are met.”

He had black eyes, not unlike Hiram’s, but his were almost too filled with soul. They seemed to point out all the lack in
her own. He dismissed his men and joined her. In deference to his ways she had laid a low table surrounded by silken pillows.
Incense burned in braziers throughout the room, giving off heat and scent. He lay down opposite the narrow gilded table from
her, his body stretched out across from hers.

RaEm poured the wine and handed it to him. “To the unification of our peoples,” she said.

He held it to his lips, swallowed, but she knew he drank nothing. “Forgive me,
adoni,”
she said, taking the cup back from him. “We are both accustomed to the wiliness of court, are we not?” She drank, wondering
how much of the powdered mandrake aphrodisiac was flowing into her veins. “You can know it is safe now.” She returned it.

It was a measure of face now; he had to drink lustily or he would be calling Pharaoh of Egypt a potential murderer. He downed
the cup, and she heaved a sigh of relief. This would be easy; she should have more faith in herself. He just unnerved her
with his steady breathing and his one, frowning god.

With a smile she summoned the slave girls. They were dressed in beads and wigs only, shaved and perfumed, selected because
of their beauty and elegant movements. Designed to fire the passions of this king.

His gaze followed them as he conversed with RaEm over the mundane matters of agriculture and court. They were purposefully
questions he could answer in his sleep. The girls served him, brushing against his body, refreshing his cup, pouring more
mandrake into his already aroused body.

RaEm blessed the gods. It was going well.

The temperature in the tent rose as the evening cooled outside. Dadua was flushed, his eyes bright, his words slurring together.
RaEm felt desire filling her body for the first time in many months. The lamps flickered; behind a curtained wall a solitary
flute played. She laughed, he jested, their occasional touches grew more meaningful, until she was leaning against his thigh
in the middle of a story and he interrupted her.

“Are you man or woman?”

RaEm threw back her head and laughed. This was exactly what she wanted. Her unsteady fingers released the clasp of her gown.
Her breasts were shameful to see, but still sensitive. She turned so that she was seated on her haunches before him. He watched
her gilded nails move over her body, pinching her swollen nipples. His mouth opened, his eyes focused on her. “What do you
think,
adoni?”
she asked. RaEm reached for his hand, placing it on her chest. Instinctively he cupped her, his dark gaze flying up to her
face.

His hands slipped over her shoulder to her neck, drawing her to him. His mouth was hot and mobile. He kissed the way he fought,
the way he negotiated, the way he did everything: he seduced her mouth slowly. His other hand moved over her bare back, cupping
her backside, pressing her against him.

“So how are you the co-regent of Egypt?” he asked RaEm, then kissed her deeply. His fingers were slipping beneath her kilt,
finding her warm and wet.

“Pharaoh … is … my father-in-law,” RaEm whispered, praying that he would not stop touching her. It had been so long; it felt
so good.

“He has another son?” he asked, suckling her breast. “His daughter Meryaten,” she slurred, feeling the heat of her body, its
want.

He froze.

RaEm writhed beneath his hands. “Don’t fear, we do not break your laws. She died.” Please HatHor, let nothing stop him, she
thought.

His fingers were curved inside her. “You were married to a woman?” His voice was sounding clearer.

“It was politics,” RaEm said, the haze fading as he talked and didn’t touch.

In one movement he pushed her away, dipping his fingers in wine, rubbing his mouth. “You freak! You were wed to a woman?”

Her shirt was off, her kilt around her waist; she was completely exposed. “It was politics!”

“What kind of creature are you?” he asked, stumbling to his feet. “What was I about to join with?” He spat, then wiped his
fingers on the table’s cloth.

RaEm was furious. “Perhaps you should ask that question,
adoni,”
she said. “How would your priests view you being with the pharaoh, masculine, of Egypt? Any slave of mine would swear I had
you on your knees, mounting you like a pig!”

He flinched as though he’d been struck.

“No one would dare suggest I was less than a man, no one has that much imagination.”

“What are you asking, Smenkhare, if that is your name?”

“You have gold. I want it.”

“
Ach!
Covetousness! I should have known!”

“Your fifty Pelesti shields and I will go away quietly.” His gaze raked her up and down. Then he shook his head. “No wonder
Shaday wanted us out of Egypt. You are a corrupt, vile creature. Tell what you will to whom you will. I don’t fear you.”

“You should!” RaEm hissed. “I have more power in this world and the next than you can imagine. I can summon lighting at my
will. I can command a thousand to die on a whim. I know the future!” She was shaking, livid, fighting the mandrake, and battling
his revulsion.

He laughed. “If you are so powerful, then why do you hold an eight-year-old boy hostage, why do you seduce a man who thinks
you are disgusting, and why do you need my gold?”

Screaming with fury, RaEm seized her dagger and rushed Dadua. She felt the blade sink into flesh, then she was thrown. Another
man spoke, his Egyptian heavily accented. “This is attempted murder, Pharaoh. Unless you want a war, leave this land.”

She looked up. The big green-eyed soldier was removing the body of a girl, an Egyptian slave girl, who had a dagger plunged
into her breast. Dadua had been felled but not marked. RaEm had killed her own. Her gaze met Dadua’s. “If you wish to continue
your pretense, you should cover your woman’s body,” he said.

RaEm looked down. She was naked. Female. Powerless.

O
NCE AGAIN WE WERE GROUPED
—this time by royal decree. Where there had been shouting, there was silence. Where there had been drinking and feasting,
there was fasting. Where the attitude had been revelry and celebration, there was now reverence and fear.

Where there had been sunshine, now we stood in pouring rain.

Again the doors were opened. Instead of a wagon, the Seat hung from golden poles, carried between the Levim like a traveling
chair. The
elohim
were holding hands, the curve of their wings protecting the actual top of the box from the downpour.

I shivered. I wasn’t going to pay attention to them. I didn’t really want to know if they moved or not. I’d prefer to think
I was drunk. Save that no one had had wine.

The blue-and-white-clad Levim stepped forward with the Seat suspended. Moving at a funereal march, they progressed solemnly.
The poles holding the Seat were at least ten feet long, three men holding each end, standing well away.

The Ark must weigh a lot more than Indy thought. Dadua walked before the Seat, wearing the stone-studded breastplate of the
high priest and a simple slave’s kilt. No crown, no jewels, for today he was a petitioner, not a king.

At the seventh step, Dadua halted. N’tan led out an ox, pure, white, and healthy. With prayers he slit the creature’s throat,
splashing blood. It soaked into the dirt, mixing with the rain, running between the bare toes of the Levim.

I darted a glance at the two golden figures that graced the top of the box. Were they closer? Don’t ask don’t tell, I admonished
myself.

When the ox was dead, three Levim dragged it away. We all waited in tense silence. Dadua took a step forward, blood spatters
washing down his legs in the rain.

Nothing happened.

N’tan blew the
shofar
as the Levim stepped forward. Step together. We all waited. Nothing happened. As a body, the tribesmen exhaled. In a solemn
measure the Seat progressed toward Tziyon of God. Another seven steps, then the second ox was sacrificed.

As a group, we moved in time with the Seat. My anxious gaze returned to the statues of
elohim.
Had they moved? Possibly closer to each other? Weren’t they only holding hands before? With each advance the tension melted
from the scene, though the momentousness of the occasion was tangible.

The weather broke, still cool since it was December, but no longer raining.

As we walked, the Levim boys began singing Dadua’s newest composition. We were listening to the debut of the Psalms. I squeezed
Cheftu’s hand. His gaze did not move from the Ark, but he did squeeze my hand back.

“Shaday is the ruler of this earth and everything on it, this world and those who live on it. He established it from the seas,
drew it from the waters.

“Who may climb to the hill of Shaday? Who may stand before the holy place? He whose hands are clean, whose heart is pure.
He who does not follow the ways of idols, or swear by those who are false.

“He alone receives blessings from Shaday, is vindicated by the god who saves him. May this be the generation of people who
seek your face, God of our Fathers.

“Lift up your heads, you gates. Be called to a higher purpose, you aged doors! Be blessed that Shaday, the king of all glory,
will come in. Who is this king of glory?

“He is
el
Elyon, strong and mighty, the god of the battle, the god of victory.”